Steps & Stories Episode 11 – Part 1:

Ameya Naik 

Welcome to Steps and Stories. Today we are incredibly fortunate to host a remarkable individual whose career journey embodies evolution, insight and profound commitment. Our guest is Rahul Bansal, the founder and CEO of rtCamp. rtCamp is a large global agency specializing in enterprise grade projects. They are trusted by high profile clients such as Google, Meta, Al Jazeera and many more. 

rtCamp stands out for its significant contributions to the open source community. They run an innovative intern program where they take 50-60 college graduates every 6 months, paying them to learn WordPress for 6 months with no obligation to continue working for the company. This popular program receives more than 90,000 applications. This initiative not only develops new talent but also instills in them a deep belief in open source.

rtCamp was not always this big or successful. Rahul started it from scratch with some friends, met some extraordinary people along the way and made rtCamp what it is today. Rahul’s career journey showcases how commitment to community can lead to extraordinary success and impact.

So come, let’s go trace Rahul’s journey. So welcome everyone again to episode 11 of Steps and Stories and today is a very special episode. I have a Co host with me Mr Himanshu Daswani. Himanshu is a dear friend, is a exact professional, passionate about careers and growth of people.

And I would like to warmly welcome Himanshu to steps and stories and maybe do many more resources. And as I have already given you introduction to our special guest today, Mr. Rahul Bansal. Rahul is the founder and CEO of rtCamp and rtCamp has been the one of the leading workplace agencies in the world. It started like I mentioned in my introduction, it started as a very small doctor event. Now is the global leader in world test solutions. And Rahul has been so kind to accept our invitation and share his stories with us. So thank you.

Rahul Bansal 

Thank you for having me.

Ameya Naik 

So Rahul Steps and Stories is all about, you know, tracing the journeys of eminent personalities and professionals that you who made it big in your special fields. And we would love to trace your career and learn from you about how you build your company, your career. And, you know, I’m sure that this is going to be very inspirational for our audience, which is mostly going to be young professions and students who are just starting their journey. 

Rahul Bansal 

I hope so. I can add value to people.

Ameya Naik 

Yeah, I’m sure you will. So now first question is about how you started. I’m sure you know you when you started, when you finished your College in 2006, then did masters.

Rahul Bansal

Yeah

Ameya Naik 

And at that time you were also a Blogger and it was your Blogger. So can you take us back a little bit to those days and tell us about how did this journey from being a young Blogger, you know, after your computer engineering, how did this transformation to being an independent class developer and then starting rtCamp? What was the story behind all this?

Rahul Bansal 

OK so I finished my graduation in 2006 but I also did post graduation so 2 more years I was in Academy but these are like. So in the last semester 2006 I came up was blogging as a hobby like it wasn’t anything serious. My first blog was not even technical blog, but I like the platform, the power it came to publish and share your work, knowledge, anything you have with the entire world at that time, that was it like sharing. But I have still figuring out what to do with my life, like professional life.

I had some pressures to do something and in between I just got a chance to pursue masters. So I just started masters. So I got 2 more years. But in this 2 extra years I got a lot of time for blogging and somewhere I came across this Google Access program which started helping make money from blogging. So I found it very fascinating that you can earn for something you like to do. Anyway, so I was I was writing anyway. I was writing code sharing with the world.

I was being believer in open source, still I believe in open source a lot. So I was doing what I would have done like anyway, and now I’m getting paid for it. So it was like a very big push that if you can make money on your own terms, then why not like and then I kind of like drifted away from typical career path. I even in the latter part like I stopped sitting on campus like when even like different companies came to our college.

Ameya Naik 

ΟΚ. So very interesting that you from blogging you considered, you know, you have an independent developer and starting your own company. Because during those days, I remember especially kids who had education in elite schools like COEP, like yourself, they would consider studying abroad or working at an MNC and trying to somehow go to the US or the Europe. So did that not cross your mind?

Rahul Bansal 

It did, actually. I still have admission from admission letter from New York University. I almost took that path but then there was some personal reason which prompted me to stay back in Pune. So I first rejected so I rejected US option twice in those days. First came from my GRE so I got good score in GRE, I wanted to PhD like I wanted to pursue very high education. I loved academic part of system. Like it’s not like some people like I drop out or something. I wasn’t drop out or anything. I was little bit misfit, but I always had good grades. I loved the 3rd theory aspect of also what is taught in the schools. So first I rejected this New York admission, later the second time the opportunity knocked me when my corporate internship. So in as an intern I did very good work for the company I was working for. And they not only offered me permanent job in the middle of 2008 global decision, they also wanted to wanted me on any terms.

So I told them. So they had this idea that I was giving GRE so that we will send you to the US, you pursue education at our expense, you do the research at our experience and become our employee. That was second item. But it there were like some reason I couldn’t go to the outside Pune. So I just stopped it all and I had to continue whatever I was doing like the blogging.

But then blogging wasn’t as mainstream. So actually it’s still not mainstream. I would say today it was it has like a speak and now the it’s mostly replaced by Instagram and different kind of content creator. So but at so from moving from blogging and not taking any job me means like a lot of financial struggle.

During that. I started freelancing, but my blogging helped me like because of my blogging, people knew what kind of guys to do. So that blogging gave me exposure and for me like getting freelancing projects was much easier like because people knew who I was, what kind of work I did. So blogging was the first step, freelancing was the second, and then that eventually, later it came.

Ameya Naik 

Fantastic. I, I’m, I’m imagining your journey like you did your computer engineering first, and then you did your masters. And during your masters you started…

Rahul Bansal 

blogging 

Ameya Naik 

Writing, yeah, That led to freelancing work because you had the confidence that, you know, people would somehow recognise you because of your and then you started getting more freelancing.

Rahul Bansal 

Yeah

Ameya Naik 

People want to do this now, but it’s so difficult to put yourself out there in the blogs because you have to be very authentic in your, you know, in your blogs. So how was how did that the race come from? Because blogging was a novelty during those days in India.

Rahul Bansal 

Yep, it was very hard to even explain somewhere like for for like almost a year or 2, my primary introduction was a professional Blogger because my majority earnings used to come from professional blogging. So it was very hard for me to explain like if I go to like say a traditionally would like some relatives wedding. What do you do for living? I do professional blogging. Professional blogging Kya hota hai. Like what is blogging? And then I should tell like like you read newspaper print media. So there is people read things online and I write things online divisible pay even people don’t pay like for your newspaper. There are advertisers for blogging, their also advertiser. And there used to be long explanation. But then so, so it’s like I found my audience very early. And so initially it started as a hobby.

I found my audience. So I never felt alone in the blogs. And most people have that initial loneliness on the open web. They, they keep writing, but nobody’s interacting with their content. And my content used to be like little more, not little like they were completely original. I used to focus on. So my content was centered around my own work. Like I used to write code and my articles were around those code or like tips and tricks and hacks, but they were all original. So it’s like anybody Googling. I used to rank very high. Get me straight out of traffic.

And yeah, my solutions always used to work. So lots of comments, lots of link sharing. So and then when I started, there was no pressure on me. Pressure came later, like pressure came towards my end of my education because now I, I needed to be independent, make a living for myself, wanted to settle down. So it’s like they were like the, but when I started blogging, I was a very much student then. So like but the like no pressure, no family pressure, no pressure to make money. So I think that helped me if you are directly jumping into blogging and expecting it to make a living on day one. It’s going to be tough like you. Like what is what can be equivalent of blogging today might be YouTube creator or Instagram creator. So even like on day one or for many months you cannot expect to, so you have to do that transition slowly.

Himanshu Daswani It’s hard only in the beginning 

Rahul Bansal 

Yeah and a lot of waiting, like waiting for that first comment or that initial subscribers failing also how to put like no matter what you do initially, it will be gold unless you and even if you go viral like today, there are this social media algorithm. If you’re not in those days, like in search engines, people don’t used to go viral like they go viral on social media today. So so that reality is still you cannot you cannot count on like your your first tweet, first video still may go viral, but there would be the long gap of non engagement, like original engagement.

So you have to plan it very well and then you cannot let every external noise become a feedback loop. Like you need to know that I’m doing right thing. Even if nobody is appreciating, I will continue to do it. And just because one random video went viral, you cannot change your complete course like that went viral. I have to keep it again and again both like you can. You can be famous, but still you may not need to pursue that path and you may not be getting success, but you still need to be on the path. So there are like 2 different things like that is why like conviction, belief in yourself comes into picture because it’s then you, you need to be use of content. Like at the end of the day, you need to be like, I have done my best, I do my best.

Ameya Naik 

Yeah.

Rahul Bansal 

You need to have that confidence.

Ameya Naik 

It’s was very intriguing, when I was studying about you a little bit, your childhood was spent rural Maharashtra.

Rahul Bansal 

Yeah, near Jalna.

Ameya Naik  

So how did? That confidence to, you know, write blogs which will be read by the whole world. Like was it something in the childhood that happened? Any any stories over there that you would like our listeners to know.

Rahul Bansal 

So, so yeah, so that’s the writing was something I was doing from childhood. Like there were like essay competitions in the school before blogging, written like some like the like the like in mainstream newspaper also there were like guest columns or like guest comments or so I used to. I got published many times in Lokmat, Sagarh. There was a even a youth oriented supplement by Lokmat called Maitra in 19…late 90s. So I used to get featured multiple times before this modern email and digital subscriber. I used to get fan mail literally by post.

Yeah, because of my like the work I used to put in like it wasn’t a huge or commercial work, but there were like some reader voice opinion, some kind of those kind of sections used to be in the mainstream media, more like user generated content.

In today’s world, what we call user generated content, that was offline version of user generated content. So I used to put like and like the it’s like you, you write and you send via post to the newspaper office and they used to pick it. And when I came to Pune to publish my own book, that was the main my main motivation to come to Pune was to publish my book.

Himanshu Daswani 

Were you aware of your unique strengths and passions that you had while blogging, while you know towards the end of the college, during those were you aware of the strengths that.

Rahul Bansal 

To be honest no. But actually I think values comes before strength. So I was clear about my values like that originality like I cannot be part of echo chamber. I cannot write paid review these guys as editorial. So that was the reason like I had to start freelancing. My blog was very like for many years the top ranking keyword with my name was Rahul Bansal Adsense income. And if you still Google today, you might come across articles from that era that people are speculating how much I may I was making them and my traffic. And so there were like some Alexa ranking.

There were different public domain information available about huge traffic that my website is to get. So I used to get a lot of traffic. I used to get a lot of offer like freebies, like paid like either take cash, either take gifts in kind, whatever you want to publish. Like, like this laptop is good, this gadget is good, but no, no, I’m not using it, so I cannot review it.

Himanshu Daswani 

So you are an influencer before before the, so, so every generation has the way of getting influence. So there will be always influencer. The mediums keep changing like so it’s like, but then it’s up to you. Like either I don’t need that money. I don’t want that money. I want of course, I wanted money because there was a pressure on. So once I graduated, I quit equal internship. I quit so not quit.

I technically first graduated. So the government stipend stopped. So from 3 income I suddenly become single income. That’s blogging income which was quite less. And I had like one year goal to get settled financially stable or purchase something else. So it’s like I had to find way to make a decent money and then it was very hard in in those moment to tempt to those offers.

That’s why it’s like your values come before strength. So even if I did some failures, everybody was doing in blogsphere. So blogging they were like used to be blogging conferences where big brands like the phone or gadgets brand used to pursue. I used to get press pass in many event and they used to pampers like anything. But then yeah, like I don’t want to do this like I will, I will figure it out.

And that’s when I started freelancing because I I realised and that is what I told like earlier, that the returns comes much later in any kind of creative work. So blogging as a creative field rather than technical field. Technology was a topic I was writing, but the medium was creative. So it takes time to gather that momentum and things like that. And then another thing, I did a risk arrangement.

At that time, I realise that I was too dependent on one company called Google. They were sending me traffic on one side and they were sending me advertisers on the other side. So my demand and supply both channel are in the hand of one company. What if tomorrow they change their algorithm? I need to diversify. I cannot depend on one company to build my life around any.

Himanshu Daswani 

Any of those values that you continued when you started rtCamp.

Rahul Bansal 

Definitely so that originality was there like authentic. So rtCamp also started as a blog network first like because it was a so rtCamp the early years majority of its revenue was on my blogging income. The freelancing practice was just started picking up. So rtCamp had more writer on payroll than developers on payroll for first 2-3 years at least. In fact, there was a designations like editor, writer, technical writer, content writer and then there were like few engineers and designer like majority of it was a blog network.

But then so, so The thing is like values are not related to blogging, freelancing or programming. They are your, your viewers like that irrespective viewers, even if you don’t win any particular work like so if you want to be original, like let me put this example just starting a restaurant. So that value will make sure that you’re not copying somebody else menu and selling it as yours or in the name of inspiration, you are just like picking somebody else specifically adding like 2 cents of yours and making it, this is our authentic food. So when you use authentic, you know that you are authentic like it. You feel it here like you can lie to others, but you cannot lie to yourself.

That’s like the checks and balances we had like so, so in when we become like this agency doing client work, the same values act as a filter like we even qualified into them something we call as a good work, good people. So it’s like, again, there were years when we had revenue pressure, the value system and respected line.

You cannot just hire us while throwing money. We need to like you as a client. We, it’s like we need to be proud of you. So legally it’s your call, If you want us to put us, put us under NDA. You don’t want us to talk about us for whatever reason. We expect that. But we should be proud of associating with you. If you are doing some shady activities. If your business is something we are not proud of, the way you make money is something we don’t like to do ourselves.

If you don’t want to be a customer, then we don’t want to be a vendor as well. So it’s like so there was a lot of filters in agency also we did like so for example, the project like I need clone of this website. It’s like is getting inspired in design is OK. I like these 3 designs and I want something based on those. But if you want total rip off, no.

If you want like there was another trend when we started agency that building this ghost websites contents in a website like creating lots of content in like pages artificial generated before AI, just copying lots of data from different news sites and stuffing keyword and generating articles. And I don’t know why Google used to rank it and it lasted for a while, but there was even I think something robot plug in something which is to just used to configure like I need 10 articles per day, this keyword. And now now those people using those that kind of technology also needed engineers to stand stand little bit different among the scammers.

Ameya Naik 

Yeah.

Rahul Bansal 

So scammers also needed developers. So so we we never do this project like.

Ameya Naik 

A lot of these things happened in the name of SEO.

Rahul Bansal

SEO, yeah, yeah but then Google eventually caught up, those companies vanished, those technologies vanished. And that that’s the thing like, because if, if you’re riding a trend, then it is going to be short lived, like you need to build something sustainable.

Himanshu Daswani 

So rtCamp started in 2009, not long after you completed your education and then your internship. So was it a natural progression entrepreneurship or was it something? So you also mentioned that, you know, you wanted to settle down. So was it was that was there a plan always along the way?

Rahul Bansal 

So, so it’s like how to put like. So that’s another thing that I said or authentic value. So rtCamp technically started in 2008 like the domain. If you look at the rtCamp domain registration happened almost a year before we filed paperwork in 2008. Initially it got rejected because I had this vision which the officer felt like more like an NGO. This is like go and register as a society in nonprofit. This is not like you build company and so my first application to register rtCamp got rejected, which is very rare in India because nobody cares. Nobody used it. Like what what what are you going to do with the business?

Ameya Naik

I’m surprised, I read it.

Rahul Bansal 

Yes, that was another surprise. So it’s like it was like I want to build like an employee centric company which is not driven by profit and blah blah blah. It was more of a like it sound sounded a lot like nonprofit because goal was not to make profit. In fact, I was, from blogging to freelancing feel my freelancing picked up very fast. By the way, I made amazing money in my first 2 months of freelancing. OK, yeah to the point that and at the same time, so this is 2008 by graduating 2008 I think June 1st April was something. So 31st May was my last day in TIBCO. I didn’t do freelancing when I was TIBCO or technically I think I was a contractor there. I haven’t read my contract but I just felt it would be wrong if I do or any other commercial work. So I waited my last day at TIBCO to finish and I made myself available only after 1st June.

Ameya Naik 

ΟΚ.

Rahul Bansal 

So that is another part of value system. Like I do not know moonlighting was legal or whether I could do it or not. But I said no, TIBCO is paying me, I cannot take any other project. So any enquiries to come I said no, I will be available only after June. And I quit and I had no idea whether and my work, what whatever I used to do as a freelancer, not even remotely related to do. The people are very nice in TIBCO if I would have asked them, they might have said go into whatever you want. And I think now as an entrepreneur, I think I was not even technically employable. I was just one contractor because now I know because they did a 10% TDS, so that’s contractor. So, so it’s like so that so that’s like so June, I started June like first few weeks were tough. By July I had a recurring line. The people I worked in June like they wanted to hire me again. Big project like first project $5, $50, $200, $300 I think in August I filed for rtCamp registration. The domain was already there.

There was a website and domain before and the application got rejected initially. Then I went to some personally like some bad patch. So I was out of focus for few month. But then my friend was like CA now he’s a CA at that time his father was here. He took that application on himself as like don’t get involved we will get your company registered.

So they filed by Mumbai even though I lived in Pune and got rtCamp registered somehow. I don’t know what they write, what they wrote, what description they wrote, I had no idea. I just sign and they and it got registered. So that’s why rtCamp started in 2009. But it was there and in that initial, that 6 month, like June to this 9 months, technically from June to March, I did freelancing.

There were people I collaborated with on projects. We even try to so I think I was not destined to be agency from day one. It was just an idea like let’s let’s build a place where employees would love to be part of, like so my survey was like how people hate companies. So that was my curiosity, like why people hate companies? Like why? Why companies can’t be loved?

What kind of organization you need to build that people would love to be part of all like I hate Monday song should not be the part of anybody’s life. Like they should look forward to Monday. They should work with colleagues that are so nice or so inspiring they should hang out with them on weekends. So it is like. So that was my whole motivation to start rtCamp. What rtCamp will do? I had no idea. I just wanted to build a cool place. It’s like more like a cafe and then we figure out what’s what’s in the menu. So then blogging was I was already doing, we could blogging, I was doing freelancing.

I moved to a freelancing client to become rtCamp client and in between there were other people who were pursuing me to be a startup co-founder. So I should I will come as a rtCamper. So it’s like so they were like this.

Those VC pitches didn’t land none of them. But we did that part also and but then this 2008 recession started everywhere. Job loss, people were getting fired. 2008 was very brutal and people say we are in recession. It doesn’t feel like anything when just Google part of 2008 recession. So and then I had like many friends without job. So I just wrote on Yahoo groups. There was Yahoo groups and the mailing list kind of thing that my company got registered. I have more work than I can take. Why you find job if you like to be part. No pressure, no employment bond like you can come anytime still keep looking for another job, the day you get it go.

So why you get it like highly better like learn something, make some money and that’s how like then I initial hiring of rtCamp like because that that it was like more of my 4 college friends and 2 more friends of friends like like everybody was friends then.

Himanshu Daswani So from yeah, from internship to freelancing or freelancing came before internship

Rahul Bansal No internship came before I once.

Rahul Bansal So blogging and internship happened together because so blogging was anyway very different activities. So blogging I was doing from 2006 freelancing I did in TIBCO for one year 2007-8 the day freelancing ended next day I put up myself on this website called Script Plans or Freelance whatever it was called then I don’t know that whether whether exist or not any marketplace would do. But the good thing I had a work in public domain like code and sample. So my profile I was able to put up like I’ve done these work.  I’m the person behind Devil’s Workshop. My sites name was Devil’s Workshop, my blog’s name.

Himanshu Daswani

Freelancing to internship and then rtCamp, quick log, quick progression. So what was the catalyst over there that made?

Rahul Bansal

I was in college like I never thought I would be a businessman or entrepreneur in any of any kind. I was purely academic. wanted to pursue research, do PhD and it’s like Dr. Rahul Bansal. That was one of the aspiration I had. I even had like my thesis topic ready. I still think only it’s something I was wanted to do then. But then for some personal reason I said like I had to, I had to earn a living and settle down and get going. So so it’s like so that pressure pushed me to freelancing first, because blogging would have been very long journey and the clock was ticking I had to or get things rolling for me but then freelancing kicked off very fast and then as I mentioned I was rtCamp was not created with any excel sheet or any market position, any research, any kind. It was just a domain name I had and a north star in my mind and we want to build someday I will build a community not company.

And that probably the reason my initial application got related because I never felt like I was building a company. It was more like a WhatsApp group kind of emotion, let’s go do together have fun most of the time. Like we used to drink at rtCamp, party at rtCamp. Super unprofessional in by today’s world or standard. And we used to work. We used to deliver amazing work in early days.

And then it’s like it’s the things started adding like so it’s like the our energy attracted other people and more people joined. Then we have to take a space. So before I realise I am entrepreneur, I want to be something I became one, like I, I realise much later, I think in August 2009, when rtCamp’s first office open for formally open that day, I realise, oh, there’s a payroll pressure now or now you cannot back out because before that everything was happening at my home. So nobody comes no problem.

I still have a blogging influencing going on first time, first time we had like the friend list got finished. Now you cannot email to your college group anymore and more people will join because jitne join karne the kar chuke, college school is over.

Now you have to hire strangers, you have to interview people you know nothing about. So that was very different feeling like. So it’s like, and then at that moment I felt like, OK, now we are becoming something like a businessman or entrepreneur. It actually freaked me out.

Initially like because it wasn’t something I signed up for and suddenly I realised all pressure on me because no matter how much I wanted to make it like round table or equal, suddenly I realise if anybody salary doesn’t get paid on time, it’s all you.

Ameya Naik 

Very happening, is there also story behind the name rtCamp?

Rahul Bansal 

So there are 2 parts. So it’s a complete, it’s the abbreviation would say it’s a round table camp. So round table comes from King Arthur’s round table where everybody who seats around is equal. And that I believe like everybody should have a voice. People should be able to like express their opinion irrespective of their like designation or hierarchy. Anybody should be able to question anybody. So it’s like a, so questioning is not arrogance. I believe it’s, it’s your way of holding each other accountable. And so that like that was like round table part of it. The camp came from BarCamp. So BarCamp was a unconference conference, but it’s called unconference and Bar Camp was inspired by a movie called Fight Club. And Fight Club was my favourite movie, still is. So it’s like, and, and in fact, from Fight Club we took that if it is your first day at rtCamp, we have to speak, sing or do whatever. So it was nothing sort of ragging in rtCamp. If it is day one in early days, like people withdrawn you, it’s like if it is day one, you have to talk to everybody.

You cannot be like sitting in corner and your first day will be memorable. When we were small like now it’s not so many things like get lost when at certain scale, but it should be a remote now like that kind of banter cannot happen on zoom call that need to be in person. So so that Round Table Camp was the original name, but it was going too long SEO like you wanted small domain and then rtCamp was a non existent word. So we thought like it will rank faster whatever we do the rtCamp, but it was really bad choice.

If I go can go back, I will not name my company something so weird like because most people couldn’t pronounce it right. Some say art camp, rat camp, rat com different, different kind of so many spelling mistakes. Anytime like if I were to tell my name, somebody, company name over the phone as can I email you or WhatsApp you because you are going to write get it wrong like you won’t in writing or going to get it wrong. So it’s like somebody they will put spaces r space t space scam. So, so, so it’s like..

Ameya Naik

Lots of those kind of problems. But it is very inspiring for me is that you know how your value systems remain persistent and your personal work as well as in the company that but when anybody starts a couple, you know startup, there’s always so many roadblocks or challenges. At least that’s what we hear. You also, you know, face those kind of challenges in the early days of rtCamp

Rahul Bansal 

A lot, in fact Until 2016 we had tough time like. We were barely profitable. There were times like I borrowed money from people to like so first 7 years or brutal like first year was good. My freelancing and blogging income was big, but as the rtCamp started becoming bigger, the revenue per employee didn’t catch up as fast as. And as I mentioned, like we had no plan, no idea whether. We did. We did products we did a lot of figuring out by mistakes and those mistakes had real cost and until 2016. So it’s like by 2016, I have burned out so much that I kind of put myself to a deadline like if, but I still remember I was like drinking with my friend on 31st June 2015. And as in like if I don’t turn this company around in 12 months, I am going to like call it a day. And in July some like we managed to finally crack something that change our destiny. So like 6 years, almost 7 years like super frustration.

But then I was not feeling bad like like 7 years of my life will go down the drain when so there was so we were almost went bankrupt like so. So it’s like there was a point I actually asked somebody to buy rtCamp some assets something. And so I wanted some 55 lakh as a money for all the assets and they were ready to have some 41 to 50 lakh, 5 lakh shortfall was there.

And that 55 lakh I only wanted because rtCamp was I think at that time some reserve something. So I needed 55 lakh to buy everybody’s notice period on. So that was my last fact. I didn’t want to say everybody go home we are bankrupt. I want to say this is your 2 months. So that was standard salary, 2 months notice in rtCamp. So I I did the math like this is everybody’s notice period would cost me. And I wanted to buy everybody’s notice period and shutdown the company. I couldn’t buy it because I was 5 lakh short on that. So it was like that low. I sometimes wonder like if that the other person would have paid 5 lakh more, I might have shutdown the shop that day itself.

Ameya Naik 

Whatever happens, happens for the good,  very scary. But what did some green shoots on the way like I read somewhere that you were mentioning that in the your first corporate client.  And I’m interested to know that story because you mentioned something that it was you were almost frustrated.

Rahul Bansal 

Yeah.

Ameya Naik 

When the first corporate client kind of approached you and you were bidding for that project, can you tell us that story and how did it happen? I think it was very quite early in the rtCamp.

Rahul Bansal 

Credit for this goes to rtCamp Round Table structure.  And I still like tell people, when people tell rtCamp that you’re not working for me, you’re not even working for rtCamp. This is you, your life and your destiny. This is your journey. rtCamp is just a station. How much time your train stops here can be different. Like some people will stay here for few years, maybe decade or 2 or maybe lifetime. That’s not an expectation, that’s not a goal. So the goal of your life is to do whatever you think has a good work. And did it again by just like medium, not to the destination.

So with that thinking, we always added a good talent and we so sometimes I really wonder like I think I was very small and very small like obscure like company in the beginning. No name, nothing like I don’t know how these people found us. There was this guy, he’s in Pune, Gajanan Sapate, you should have podcast someday, Social Champs.

He was our marketing head at time, too overqualified, now I look back I don’t know why he joined rtCamp and how we ended up there but we hired him. He join us and that’s the round table part. Like he without asking me or even discussing he he did put rtCamp on LinkedIn and did amazing marketing work. So somebody started looking for a top WordPress agency on LinkedIn and I personally didn’t like LinkedIn. I still don’t like LinkedIn. So there’s no, there’s no way I could ever do anything on LinkedIn. But that client found something Gajanan has created for rtCamp as an article marketing it. That’s how they approach us.

And then they started asking us like typically this enterprise questions. I was like, I was still engineering engineer. I had like kaam kya karna hai batao. Why am I requesting these compliances something like so of like do you have what we call that thumb scanner on the biometric attendance system? So many compliance, there’s so many. And I was not getting it like. The WordPress in GPL is going to be on a server.

Why it’s so much time and we’re not putting yourself, we’re not hosting yourself in our office. No, we have data protection mechanism and all. So that initial conversation frustrate me too much that I just wanted to run away. So when but like I thought like like as a courtesy, I felt like I didn’t want to say bad thing, but I just wanted him to go away.

So iwe put absolute amount as a quote and just shipped it and assume abhi ye wapas nahi ayenge. They came back 

Ameya Naik

Awesome.

Rahul Bansal

And then they came back. So then they, I don’t remember the exact name of the person somebody in there call some of sales, like my my discomfort handling there isn’t like that’s why you charge high to enterprises. That’s like that. This is the large enterprise are dealing here and this is a very big company, very good learning experience for them, very good people.

My irritation came from my different upbringing. I would say professional like I was dealing with always solo operators like indie business. Coming from blogging, my freelancing clients were mostly bloggers. Initial day, most clients were bloggers and suddenly I have a public listed company knocking at my door so that like too much of a gap. The number of people on their call or like compliances and all like those people, that wasn’t even our total client base. So like so it will getting involved for one website and I felt ridiculous like look, and then I so initially took time for me to appreciate. Now I appreciate when the last large enterprises is our main business.

I appreciate and I also understand why enterprises hands are paying more for something like like a website you might get for $50. Why they end up paying 5 thousand,50 thousand, even 5 billion for some projects like like even our large governments websites are very expensive because privacy laws, everything.

Nobody’s going to sue Devil’s Workshop founder for accidentally leaking his mailing list. But that’s not same for Google. So but then this rtCamp culture kind of pulled that client. I wouldn’t I would have never went on Linkedin and credit our marketing stuff there whatever. I don’t even know till like what Gajanan put whether he created a page or post or I had no idea. But then that client came. They paid well and they paid not only well. They they taught us like like like many things they taught us. And this stage there then give them the renewal year after year and they remained our client until they got acquired by another public listed so and then we thought now without this is the end so but it didn’t end there like the new publicly listed company also become our client. There is that key like how long this large accounts can the lifetime revenue this large accounts can give you.

So as I said, like nothing was planned for rtCamp, no market research, no Excel sheet or ever harmed in building rtCamp. Everything was happened like just by destiny and it still and it still does that way like the most recent example.

So this is like super recent in June I came from Europe. Look into accounting data Jan, Feb, March, April, May 5 months straight up loss after many profitable year like that street that started in 2016 to first time. So so agency in agency business especially which works with large intervals, revenue is nonlinear this like your salary monthly, but project milestone.

So sometimes it happens key one month goes down negative, another month catches up. And at the year level we were always profitable. Year level we were never in loss and from 16 but this one month up and down, Chalta Hai 5 months straight up loss we saw first time definitely alert vendor this IT recession ka talk everybody like all my consultant mentors, everybody you have to downsize. We had like 40% people on bench too big bench for like we are still like mid level startup.

I would say 250 is not like very big in India, especially for IT consulting too much pressure. And I just said logic zero. We have money, we have savings, we can all eat. So let’s say if you file for some, so they were like number like 40 people we should lay off and we should come under 200 like some 235-190 something ek bar a jaate and dekhte hai, nai yar, like every rtCamper is like diamond hum tarashte hain, we don’t hire the people ,we, we go to colleges, we have an insane long cycle. It’s like we go to this like 6 month of training usase pahle like we have this long hiring process and like it’s like itna mehnat karke itna inko laya hai and we cannot just let go.

And for what? We are in losses for 5 months we lost money. It was like almost half million hole in our balance sheet. But it’s like we have a lot bigger cash reserve. And if you fire them probably we will. So if like lesser than things are not going to turn a I will eat us. And this is a doomsday. sab kuchh nasi khatam hone vaala hai so Ali hota hai. So 190 people will survive you say 3 years with death reserve and 240 people might survive like 2 years, infinite to nahi chalega so we have to figure out. We have to figure out like how to handle the crisis. The number of difference headcount is not going to make us like invaluable like dono case mein.  If you are extend the doom, do saal ya teen saal, I am not going to fire, but I posted because there was revenue pressure numbers, everything was so little chatter on the floor. So I put post on slack. Yes, first transparency, we are in losses for 5 months. Then the most important thing but there will be no layoff. And then there was a long message like explaining microeconomics and all those detailing for the TLDR was we are in losses but there won’t be any layoff. And then I don’t know how it works testing your karma, yesterday, the reason I have posted rested, you have posted message. So 6 months also we went in loss because I posted this message in June also went, you know, July we back in profit. So 6 month strict in loss and then July we backed in profit.

And the same transparency I went in everywhere to the with other partners also. So there was a partner from another industry they wanted to do a joint venture with rtCamp. So the on the negotiation paper I kind of backtracked but I just wanted to be honest. I didn’t want to say you are giving me bad deal or idea kharab in any Sir this point we started discussing. And in between now our financial health has been changed. Your idea is still good, but I think we should wait for a year to invest further in any new product or any new alliances and I literally showed them this slack message, internal stuff and 5 months loss making the month report is it, I am sorry for wasting your time. Arey roku yaar wo bole, so if you get an agency work that that you can take that right? Yes Sir, that’s our bread and butter. Your people to the agency work but you don’t want invest in product. Nice, like you can hire me as a your vendor I will build your product, I don’t need partnership, I don’t need profit sharing. Or wait for a year. Let me turn around the things, ruko yaar, he literally give us back three invoice and actively like pursued, pursued in those partnerships and helping us grow,, one project to start this Monday. So that’s the power of transparency, honesty comes in.

If I would just to walk out from the table to to say to as like this is a bad idea, I don’t want to put into into these or something. Why like? Idea bad ho doesn’t matter, I cannot invest so. So what?

Ameya Naik 

You just mentioned your belief in people ,called all each of your employees are diamond as.

Rahul Bansal 

I strongly believe that each of my employees is diamond.

Ameya Naik I have so many follow up questions, but before we end up first part of this podcast, I would like to ask you one, which is now this whole whole AI disruption that is happening in the world. How is rtCamp responding? How do you, do you have strategies already made? How do you think this is going to impact you as a person, rtCamp as a company and what are your thoughts about it?

Rahul Bansal 

So impact is already there. That initial streak of losses, I won’t say happened because of a I, but then how do I put like this? So AI has made difficult to manage expectation. So as I always put every business or every relationship, not just business, is basically an expectation management, an expectation change. You have to buckle or you lose or you just losing that relationship or a client or so this a I has put a lot of strain. Expectation are changing a lot. And for most part those changes are intangible or in many case absurd. Like The thing is this. So this is this is this cycle. Like there’s AI. So first, I do believe AI has a value, but more importantly, even before that, the all high or everything that’s surrounding a I today is the generative AI way. When you talk AI has been around for a very long time, like clustering algorithm or like they’re like forecasting algorithm.

A lot of AI was in use was there suddenly this gen AI is what everybody talking. It’s like it’s like calling toothpaste  Colgate. It’s like Al is like Al is like it’s not with the gen Al or Google is like search. So when people say yeah, they and the gen Al they think like can replace human . I always feel that it can augment human, not replace.

It’s like like many times that post goes on viral when somebody post that when calculator it and replace accountant, same thing. It made people productive. Personally, I am big fan of AI, I do a lot of work using Al tools.  I have paid subscriptions of many Al tools and I’m very happy. I’m super happy as a Gen Al customer or consumer, my team is also using Al, but then I don’t think it can replace people. It can reduce some jobs. So, so let me put this way, Say that 10 people doing or something like say customer support and because of AI, the 8 of them will be able to do the work of 10. So those 8 will replace 2 people, not the AI itself. So it’s like if you’re thinking AI with a AI, you can have zero people in customer support. That’s not going to happen.

How AI will replace those people is by reducing time to find solution, time to do research like , you doo a lot of podcast. So in you might be using AI already. So it’s like in earlier world you would have to do Googling. There are lots of links and putting notes, kisne kya padha and then collaborating and then so much work. Now you ask about a person or something and it gives you very good starting point. You’re still, you still have pressure on like those who understand AI can verify. So it’s like, but still over a time gets saved. So that time saving means less people can do more. So, so number of people required to do the same job will shrink. But it is shrinking very slowly and in some places shrinking maybe not every place, but then this, this, this, this gain property and whatever is sold by Al startup is very high point.

Then there are consulting companies, the bigger one, which kind of guide large enterprises like Al should randomly like 40% of workforce company, your cost of like something should go by 30% out of the way. And then that puts the pressure on vendors like that, that, that kind of create like we, we, we saw that report by some reputed form that AI should bring this. Wo nahi bolenge to hum hire nahi karenge.

So if they would say they don’t use AI. So it’s like we, we need to use a Al has some value, but it’s not like overnight is going to replace people. It will definitely reduce either people or you can get. So either you can get more work done from the 10 people or you can have 8 people doing 10 people so. But it’s.I don’t think we are anywhere, anywhere near where we can say zero people are needed. Like if everything is AI, what we will do. And it’s like, so some changes are over hyped. It’s more like there’s a, there’s a that companies who benefit from this side. So they kind of hyping, keep hyping this.

Ameya Naik 

They want to play with the sentiment and the markets? vested interest.

Rahul Bansal 

Yeah. Vested interest.

Rahul Bansal 

Yeah, Yeah.

Ameya Naik 

So that’s all that positive, though I think we can take a break to the first part of this broadcast. So in the second part, we have to talk a lot more with Rahul about his north star, his passions and what he really wants to do further with his with his own, his own life, his own career. And we will trace his journey in the future. So thank you so much, Rahul for this part of this podcast.

Rahul Bansal

Thanks for having me.

Steps & Stories Episode 12 – Part 2:

Ameya Naik 

Right. Hello and welcome. Welcome back to Steps and Stories, Part 2 of our podcast with Mr. Rahul Bansal. We’ve been very fortunate to have Rahul today and he been so kind and so open about his career path so far and shared some wonderful stories. His passion, his clarity of thought and especially his people centric approach to running his life and his company has been very inspiring. So here we are in second part and I’m sure there are going to be so many more stories and inspirations to take away from the second Part 2. So thank you for joining us again.

Himanshu Daswani 

So now let’s talk about partnerships and this my favorite section actually because being a part of rtCamp system for 2 years, so I’ve experienced a lot of this. So let’s talk about partnerships, not just the business kind, but also friends, family life, partners. I say partners plurally because it’s not just the spouse that is alike, but it’s also the friends that come into the picture. So how did they shape Rahul, the person that he is today or the CEO that he used to like the entire ecosystem of partnerships that you have?

Rahul Bansal 

Yeah. So as I mentioned, rtCamp started with friends only. I had no plan or any kind of big vision to build any kind of business or freelancing was something I was doing out of necessity. I want to do something grand surely like those. But that’s a dreamer kind of phase. And then I met these people. These friends were looking for something. They join the mission, they become part of it. First 6 co-founder, then initial 7th, 8th, 9th. They are almost like first 10 hires. We’re all friends like friend of friends, of friends like some like it was always like through reference. Everybody has has played their role like in different way like like the 2 co-founders have right now.

Radhe, so Radhe as a co-founder was more like our ATM as mentioned like there were months when there used to be salary shortfall. And so he and his lifestyle was very frugal. Like he he used to live in the low least amount of money. Like so he used to save a lot. We used to take salaries like whenever possible.

So there were months like rather than taking salary, he used to give his savings back to rtCamp so rtCamp can pay others. And to the point where I feel like we borrowed too much from Radhe. And one day I bring up the topic like here to jyaada ho raha hai at what if this company crashes and I do not end up I have like I would not have any means to pay you back. You are so kind. He offered to convert a debt to equity. I trust rtCamp will make it big.

So it is good to have people around you who trust in your vision more than you. Then Radhe has more trust that rtCamp will be something big. And his question for is to be very abstract like I still remember before even that first office between March to August when rtCamp was operational from my like home like that was one, one bedroom flats. Very we used to work from my home and on one day on a walk is like, do you think like can we create a company that will be able to generate 100 jobs for WordPress

So here he was like I would say at bigger anticipation like whatever you are doing Kuchh bada hoga is and he trusted me when things were like very like tough like when we were like no cash flow, losses. I am borrowing from him and like I had no. So I don’t think he did out of any like futuristic mind. He was just kind that there is convert my definite equity compared with the right of Hojayega what.

Himanshu Daswani 

What makes sense to be more interesting is that you didn’t just start it with friends, you also scaled it.

Rahul Bansal 

Yeah, yeah.

Himanshu Daswani 

Your friends, right? And they still remain to be friends with. You or not to now an impressive 250 plus the account the entire system that you have rtCamp the number of people that you have. What made you confident like you know these are the people that I want to start my business with like these are the friends or.

Rahul Bansal 

Aisa kuch nahi tha, jo aaya hazir to wazir. So I just send a Google mailing to my mailing list. Those who turned up and I had nothing to lose like I was doing my freelancing. So I just emailed to Yahoo. Good that yeah I started this jiske baad job nahi hai Those looking for can come, Radhe came. But again Radhe was like so Radhe was my room partner also before so it is like so we had a very good bond in fact. So radhe join somewhere in the March like before that I don’t count rtCamp like I used to meet people when we talk about things. But from March it became official when we got the company registration open bank account and all Radhe join. Next day he get call from his ex-boss, arre Radhe I am starting new company aaja, so I just committed to my friend yesterday and I am his first employee so that time I did not even offered them equity or anything.

There was no discussion and there is nothing was that is not my mind like we were, we had no clue that we are building something big but rather you got led by 1, just committed to him he will like It will be demoralising for him to lose his first employee on day one and so better pay by proven ex-founder. Like I was first time founder, the boss was second,  3rd time founder and much like there was no comparison between me and his ex-boss and I later work with that person. Amazing person, very good entrepreneur, huge respect for him but rather choose to stick back. Vivek came via friend who was also one of the person who was started rtCamp together. Like you could like we like there was some friction between us and it didn’t he didn’t last with rtCamp for now. So he just parted ways before we could even operational completely like this person what Vivek and Ashish, so ye dono to jaane wale hai, you don’t we don’t care about you. This is rtCamp, this is ours. So you decide we want to quit, we want to stay. We are staying with rtCamp. So that was Vivek. So it’s like whatever friction between 2 is your personal issue rtCamp No, nobody’s quitting either because of either of you..

Himanshu Daswani 

You set any ground rules? Since it’s a lot of friends now, did you set any ground rules early on? Like was there any tough conversations that were had or did it all happen naturally?

Rahul Bansal 

It all actually happened naturally. The thing is like, so let me put this way how to put like, let me put bluntly, things revolve around money. We have, we, we the start was very good. It was a like a dreamy start. In fact, I still remember in September we were planning like first anniversary. We will celebrate in like let us take everybody to foreign country in something like that. And because my freelancing practice was big Devil’s Workshop was one of the top technology blog in India at that time. Writers were good, initial hires was very good. So we saw no reason for us to this thing will slow down. In fact, we we open our second office I think in just one and a half year. Then it hit the roadblock like in around 2011 actually I went through some personal setback and that affected company a lot. So that took few years to get us back on track.

But then initially it is just like all this tough conversations happens when things go wrong like this, like layoff discussion, 5 months in red and all the leadership like it is like they were kind of trying to comfort me that if I were to take a layoff call, it is natural. It is like ghar aja koi tere ko gussa nahi gharega is like nobody will hold you. You are not doing anything you will. That’s how businesses operate. That’s how capitalism work. And I literally like everybody kind of made sure that I won’t carry burden or guilt of layoff co-founders leaders like numbers everything like. But then I decided nahi karenge and everybody was like OK and somehow like there is a luck. Also like like I mentioned like July turnaround, yesterday only we posted 2 job openings. So from higher June we were discussing layingoff of 40 people, like not discussing the the the idea popped up. I just killed that idea obviously next day before it ballooned. Some peoples unconscious or subconscious minded in any ye hoga any this is like layoff nahi hoga and August, 2 months later we are like -20 we need 20 more people, so it is like 40 layoff karte to kya karte and but then there is a no way of forecasting this in June, June Ki. It was all guts, intuition and somehow I have been lucky. So I play plainly put, like I have been lucky. And so my team kind of sometimes counts on my luck. Like 2. You will figure it out. So it’s like, I know it’s not a logical answer, but I think the the bigger underlying thing is trusting each other like so it’s like and and we have been open communication. For example, like you mentioned, I came from rural Maharashtra.

I was schooled in Marathi medium. So that that actually one of the more interesting story in my life when I came to Pune, it was not the engineering I was scared of. I was a very good science student always like 96-98 out of 100 math like it is like good. Like suddenly everything in English was like tough for me and to the point like it was like a socially like you will look down if you are not talking in English. And coming from Marathi medium always even discussing science subject in Marathi among our school friends and with teacher like after the lecture and all that English pressure and that character rtCamp started like my English was not very good, but I tried like during my college days like we used to watch English movies, subtitles.

Then I used to just make call call to random call centers, select English and have a conversation that was like speaking English practice aur kis se baat karoon, like I will just call it a call center, any random call center inquire about plans, pricing, random stuff just to get some speaking English at least.

And then rtCamp started. Still my English was very bad, but Vivek was very polished. So that was a comfort we had so so anytime I am on a call anything Vivek used to leave me feedback, you pronounce that word wrong? That should have been this, so so he he made sure that I become better person or like the personal development. So it is not like tere ko coding achchhi aati hogi baki communication, he is better than me. He is more polished and so we try to fix each other.

It is not like we are competing or completely separate. OK you know call to code but it will be better if you come on call and explain. So if English is a barrier, lets fix it till they take to like. And this is very open in rtCamp even. Even rtCamp engineer sometimes give me feedback like in townhall. Like if I am given internal speech after call, they will send me in DM, at 32nd minute you mentioned wrong even in this podcast I might have pronounced few words wrong. I will get feedback, from my team like and and irrespective of ranks and hierarchy.

So it is like so it is like so I think that that round table is a central expert here because people know that they can they can tell you in my face like he like Imran told me that content hota hai It is a content creation not content. Content is a feeling of fulfillment something like that. So spelling alag hai, pronunciation alag hai, so this minor nitty gritties, we learn each other with each other. So so rtCamp made me, I did not build rtCamp build me who I am today. Like and it’s not just a co-founder but many rtCampers together like and feedback at so many level like like communication skill, stress management, so many things like the the Vipasna meditation, I follow a lot came from rtCampers.

Ameya Naik 

Beautiful. I mean great stories. And when we are hearing this, I’m sure everybody’s feeling wow, such a rosy world of rtCamp. But I’m sure right when making business decisions, there would have been some disagreements at some.

Rahul Bansal 

Yes.

Ameya Naik 

And then you had all these friends. So how did you separate ego with logic when dealing with friends? And if you ever feel that, you know this friendship might not last this business decision.

Rahul Bansal 

Let us put this way so friendship and partnership got 2 different, friendship khatam nahi hoti, so I am still friends with my ex co-founders. So like like some people didn’t not last initial struggle. There was one disagreement over rtCamp should do more Joomla which I completely oppose and then the that co-founder choose to do another like to he did not see future in WordPress and I do not like hold them wrong. Like at in 2019 WordPress was way smaller than Joomla, so they so they were. So their decision was based on market data and I had nothing against Joomla.

I still do not have anything against any software. My another value system was that dog fooding ourselves. So we are not using Joomla. My only problem was we are not using Joomla. We cannot sell something that we do not use. We have to be user of our own medicine like so it is like WordPress was powering our blog network, WordPress powered my freelancing practice.

So how can we sell Joomla just because it is so has so much marketshare, So Windows ka jyaada hai, so let us start on closed source company. Let us chuck open source. The proprietary software had bigger market share. Then I do not know what is today true today or is there any formal way to track market share of open source versus close source. But there are things values like open source Joomla was open source, open source box was sticking but then we are not using Joomla that person chose something else but we remain friend. So in 2019 when I started my fitness journey he was the one who introduced me to, so there is another amazing company in Pune. I would say, community FITTR. So that So I just started my fitness journey in 2019 3rd-4th time. But this time my it went well and a lot of credit I give to that co-founder, ex-co-founder. He saw that I am trying to turn my life around my fitness health around.

And he messaged on Facebook like it is a FITTR group on Facebook, join it. And yeah, I did not do that. So, so yeah, so we did as a partner, we did not last. But then friendship don’t get affected like so because that kind of maturity we have like even when rtCamp was about to crash in 2016, it would not have cost of friendship. Like there was like this kind of between 3 of us. Like there was this silent message like this can end this year. So Radhe was trying to find something back home in Nagpur where, continuing his father’s business.

Vivek was, Vivek already filled form for MBA. He wanted to take a break and do further education but uska admission hua nahi. So let’s lookour luck. He might have went that year, but he did not got, he was looking for some French MBA college, which very I am not able to recall his name, but yeah. So so it is like yeah, so that disagreements, but but then bigger time is like you trust each other.

So for example, I still have one incident in US. So Vivek was in US, I was in India and he suddenly. So there was a deal in the pipeline like presales stage and he was in Jersey staying at his brothers place. He said keep I will go tomorrow to another town to just pay a visit to this client on such a short notice. And we were like like we were better like this was 2018-19, I guess 18-19 set to go to Chalo that one result must be 18 or 19. So we were back from our bad days.

But we were still very conservative in finance with this chhe-saat saal like when we had such a tough time, garibi dekhne ke baad. We were like we used to save money a lot, emotion might remember like we always used to scout like the cheapest deal everywhere. So and he is planning last minute flight which is like airfare skyrocketed, I wouldn’t not have done that, but since he that Ki karna so he went with his hunch. I said OK, right. So that is the thing like I disagree with the idea, but I was like, I may not agree with you, but I respect you go and do it. You feel you need to do it to do it and then that he managed to close that account is still with us like it is one of our, I think 5 definite, top 10 account definitely.

So it is like so so that is where like this round table and understanding comes into picture like as a CEO feel like here this is a bad investment like it was very expensive, like super expensive and the deal size everything was small. The the deal confidence was very low. But he felt like Ki Jana hai.

He went and then that visit tilted things in our favour client what whenever those client was looking for a local presence and so that is why I feel like you we are not American companies so we are not going to get this in anyway. But he went, what he said, I do not know there but we got that deal. So this is how it happens. Like you, you need to give other people also space to call the shots, like take the decisions, take the resource sometimes like so there were like many opposites also like there were many failures in rtCamp.

So one of the manager we had once wanted to run a campaign. We asked for like some $1000 in Adwords credit just to run. Then I knew from the day one, this campaign is going to flop and it flopped. We got zero lead out of that campaign. Koi baat nahi. You learn how to how to use Google Adwords. So let’s let’s take this as $1000 how to use Google Tools as a lesson. 

Ameya Naik

So in hindsight we realise a lot of things, right, it is small decisions which you might today feel like you’re lucky, like you mentioned this couple of times, you’re lucky, but that openness in your leadership probably also made your luck.

Rahul Bansal 

Could be like

Ameya Naik 

Right, because I felt that way when you were narrating all these stories. Because at in that moment you may not realise that this is something profound that I might be doing by giving people their space. But you know, more often than not, when you give people space, they come through.

Rahul Bansal 

Yeah.

Ameya Naik 

I’m sure there are stories like just mention that there might be a instances that people may not come through, but that is learning.

Rahul Bansal 

Yeah, so it’s like you win some, you lose some, but in the end, like, so my goal in rtCamp is always to pay people on time. That’s how I wake up. Like I want people to get paid on time. I have like, definitely. We have dreams and like aspirations but we are not like that penny wise in any like let’s squeeze as much as possible. Even when that I mentioned like in June, we posted that no layoff.

We are a quarterly appraisal cycle, so June last week was a quarter end. There were people who join in that quarter historically were up for appraisal. We gave their appraisal like 2 years runway will be reduced to 18 months maybe so. So but then you already worked last year and you did good work. We have reserve, so why should your appraisal not happen. But about like might be some pressure on the appraisal numbers. But we went ahead with appraisal. We did not cancel it.

So it is like and then this, this is people remember like of course, like there is no obligation or expectation ki company ne itna kiya hai, you must do things being done. You do it out of your own value or consciousness like because I cannot sleep with that. The only reason we don’t do layoff is because so there will be eventually layoff, how they put like so everything has an end.

Every company, Google, Microsoft, rtCamp will end one day. It can be this year, next decade, next century. It’s it’s, that’s how we design like human, companies are also models like every company will end one day. So the my idea is that when it ends for rtCamp, it should end equally for all of us. It should not be like I am firing all the people and cashing out and working with the fancy retirement. That is something I cannot live with. I won’t be able to sleep.

That is the only reason we don’t do layoffs like like suddenly making 40 people out of job. How can you sleep with like and when you know you are so much reserves and from where those results came? rtCamp was started from zero. So whatever we built. So like built by people. So it’s common wealth.

Himanshu Daswani 

On that note of, you know, employees and some working out, some not working out, you know, of course the booting that you have, we always make friends, right? And throughout your journey of rtCamp, did you come ,of course, you have a lot of friends that are still with you and did you ever come across people or you know, friends that you say that you know, I want them to stay friends for the rest of my life. Or some employees that you hire as employees who became very essential, who grew, grew up into the coding also grew as your friends. Were there such people who came along the way that now you want them to stay friends for the rest of your life or.

Rahul Bansal 

So friendship by the mentioned like friendship stays. So there are many people who join rtCamp and quit midway. But I’m very good friend with them. Like, we meet, we hang out. So, so that’s that’s like a maturity like so it’s like an expectation management happens on the both side. Like for example, they have certain financial expectation to gain. So this is one thing to say you don’t deserve. This is another thing that we based on what you are bringing to the table, we cannot pay you that much. 

So not making it personal or not how to put like not demonizing somebody for their financial. My need might be different. So that as I mentioned that we do not do layoff because it my conscience doesn’t allow, especially when we have reserves, one if we run out of reserve like 2016 episode, everybody would have been laid off equally me, I actually prepared my resume shortly, shortlisted 2 companies where I want to top for next job, that kind of exit I am OK with. But it cannot be like everybody go home empty handed or with severance package and I walk away with like lots of cash for me that is not but then it works for some people.

If it works for you, OK, I am not going to judge you. So some people like have like even though we are friends, they they were like, OK, I want to try something different, chalega, go try. I want to start my own agency that also happened.

So many of my ex-rtCampers and colleagues started other businesses. I referred client to them. I referred people to them, In this podcast, I only referred Gajanan and for your podcast. So it’s like, so this is like a how do I put like you don’t take things personally like friend, it’s like we are friends only if you stay in my company. That’s not friendship there.

So both are different like staying some and you see it can be opposite also, somebody can stay forever with your company and still you won’t count them as a friend. Friendship is a personal like you. You don’t link it like just because you’re working certain years.

It’s a more of a wide thing like you you wipe together, you like you are certain sports, you drink, you smoke. You become friends it’s like at work, no work. So it just coincidence you have in my case since I have almost no life outside work, my most friend happened to be my work friends, either the current rtCampers or ex-rtCamper or other business owners like from the same industry.

Himanshu Daswani 

In hindsight, do you think rtCamp would have had the same set of cultures or same set of values if it wasn’t started by friends?

Rahul Bansal 

I think I wouldn’t have started rtCamp seriously like if I didn’t meet my friend like, I had the idea about a company like more like what you call as a like more like I have a dream. Like this can be a company where so like no employment bond as you can be friends. You can have tough conversation about salaries, about anything you can be respectful in saying no. So it is like all those things. So I had like so I when I used to see like people hate boss and things like that. So for me to video why it has to be so hard like if you are quitting your job.

So even I have faced like in rtCamp, people give fake resignation reason, maa bimar hai, notice period kam kardo, things like that. And then like jooth kyun bol rahe ho yaar and they were like no company I heard for like if you be honest, tell na you’re getting better pay. I will try to match if I can. If you’re not, it’s perfectly fine and about notice period, if you’re on my billable project, I will request you to stay back otherwise then I can relieve it.

But then I realise baki companies, majority of them are like very go very like evil on employees like when they try to quit, especially good employees, they try to make their life like PF atka de so that I think abhi to like government has made some amazing changes ki you cannot with employer cannot withheld employee PF. But that I felt absolutely uska paisa, his right. How can company like create friction in withdrawing PF And there are many things like that.

I was like so I had rtCamp this vision ki aisi company banani hai, with friends it become easier because like these are all emotional reason like there was nothing like logical in this or there. This is not as I said, no excel sheet were harmed in building rtCamp. So so how you put like nai aisa karenge, we will be nice to employees, nice even when they are exiting. You know how how are you going to prove you are nice when exiting for that somebody need to exit then only then.

So just imagine on your career page you give this promise, hey we will be nice to you if you decide to leave rtCamp. So how are people are going to realise they are saying truth. For that you have to start, hire people. Then some people, for some reason need to leave and then they need to have good experience that they will tell other people that arre we had a good time, like you can join that company. So it is a long process, so on day one how can you make that promise and how can you prove that you will live up to that promise? But friends ke saath like it was easy.

They they were like yes, this this this looks like a pleasant. It did attract like initially we started, one of the co-founder, so it’s like not everybody was like looking for a job, like Radhe had another offer in on day one of his join. There was no formal offer letter or anything, he could have just walked away and I said we were friends so I wouldn’t have said anything to him. There was another person who joined us because it’s like he felt like we are, we are partying, we are not working like I want to join this dude but you are getting so much paid. I think he was getting paid 50 thousand per month at that time. And I think we offered him 10 thousand.

Ameya Naik 

Wow.

Rahul Bansal 

And pee ke subah nikal ja, next day like paper dalke aaya. And he actually came, like like he almost took like 80% pay cut in 2009. Like that is like the recession time just to be part of rtCamp, they were like people like, I still remember there was an engineer. So when we were very transparent. So our HR called yeah you got shortlisted. But so that time we my initial, So I need to read people and I was very adamant I will not going to take phone interview, last round has to be amne samne in person because every hiring was like critical for startup and this person was in Mumbai.

So we have a very transparent communication like we are not going to pay you travel allowance and we don’t want you to waste your money. So if you ever happened to be in Pune, this offer is open. This interview slot is open forever.

So there is nothing like it, you have to come in 7 days or 10 days tu jab bhee Pune ayega, drop here. We will talk if it works out, work together, otherwise sorry. Next day he was in office, took the first train from Mumbai and reach rtCamp’s office.

By the time I walked into office and I was feeling bad like if nahi hua iska. How I am going to justify ke arre, but he was also like quiet like I had some work today, so I came back to meet a friend. So then he took pressure off me because he kind of felt and then that person got hired.

But like that’s the thing like like so we were how do I put like, as a startup, we were very attractive. Like people were, people wanted to join us for the culture that we were creating. Like there was no screening of your academics. Like why should we demand college degree when no college teaches WordPress, the only thing we use.

So rest we will figure out during job, technical skill and but so and we used to prominently advertise even if you are dropout, misfit welcome.

Ameya Naik 

OK.

Rahul Bansal 

So we used to proactively say even in our job application drop down, there was a, I think there was a qualification option – dropout. Drop out, graduate, something like that, like student. So there were 2-3 options. Basically we wanted to check are you able to join  full time or are you still a student? So, and so there was some like option where people used to, we used to very upfront like if you are dropout, it’s perfectly fine, you can apply here.

Ameya Naik 

Unique indeed and that’s the power of vision, clarity of thought and the strength of culture that Rahul created at rtCamp. And there is more to come in episode 3, we will go deeper in Rahul’s mindset and try to understand how Rahul aligned his vision with the business and what keeps him going. Thanks and hope to catch you in the next part with Rahul.

Steps & Stories Episode 13 – Part 3:

Ameya Naik 

Hello and welcome to another episode of Steps and Stories, the podcast where we dive deep into the journeys of professionals who are shaping industries and communities with their work. We have been speaking with someone who has built not just a successful company, but also a culture rooted in openness, learning and contribution. This is our final episode with the incredible Rahul Bansal, the founder and CEO of rtCamp, known worldwide for its open source excellence and enterprise grade solutions.

In this conversation, we will explore Rahul’s passion for open source contributions and why giving back to the community has always been at the heart of rtCamp. His unique approach to leadership and innovation, balancing the challenges of running a global agency with solving complex enterprise problems.

Why he deeply believes in hiring freshers, investing in their growth and trusting them to make a big impact. And of course, how he continues to learn and evolve as a founder amidst a fast paced tech world.  So if you have ever wondered how to grow in tech, embrace community driven work, or carve your own authentic career path, this episode is packed with insights you would not want to miss. So let us dive in.

Ameya Naik 

Well, I want to move a little bit to you know rtCamp’s business decisions and learn from it. But you are always a big supporter of open source and you decided to build the company for WordPress, on WordPress, of WordPress. So did you always feel passionate about contributing to the community which is open source and where did it come from?

Rahul Bansal 

Open source was as more of a, how do I put like, so when we grow up, like we have certain world views. And as a teenager. I was I was a lot into politics. So I was very passionate about politics. And when it comes to politics, I was a lot more passionate about socialism and communism so I found open source to be equivalent of that, when in the technology world so I was naturally attracted to that. That you are doing things for people, people are doing things for you, Profit is secondary. In fact, that is actually why I feel open source aligned so much with my value systems like because reproducing source code does not cost a lot.

So why sell it as a like again and again, unless so the even the business model around open source are like if I we sell support because support takes time or we sell customization because we are building something only for you. And that is another way I like open source business model and because I did not want. And another thing was the ownership like, like especially in the case of WordPress, like the GPL software.

So the the, the way you are using WordPress, nobody can stop you from doing that like because that’s how the open source of GPL work. And I wanted that clarity because I find it very odd that you buy something and some companies and hey, we have changed in licensing plan and pay more or stop using more software.

So that that’s why like open source is very critical. Even now we started doing things beyond WordPress, like we are doing a lot of work in ERP world, which was ERPNext, same open source values, same GPL software. And so in the journey, like even when things turn, like super green from June 2016, there were times when we had this figuring out next bit, we had pressure to be Shopify partner.

Ameya Naik 

OK.

Rahul Bansal 

We are technically Microsoft partner also. So I don’t know when we become one, what we have. So all these like, but we never promoted anything proprietary like we are very clear that where we at least, so as a company we use many things like we use Slack which is not open source, we use Google products, many of them are not open source like Gmail.

But then we had very clarity like what we use is our choice but what we are giving customer it has to be open source. So whenever we are building something for you, it’s going to be open source. And when we hire, we also look for people who are passionate about open source, skill is secondary, skills we can teach like, we have L&D department, amazing department. They can train people very well.

But our hiring filter, biggest filter is like, so we look for student who contributed to open source during their academic year out of passion, without any expectation of money or fame or anything in return. And those are our like super, lik,e start like those are the candidates we pursue a lot.

Ameya Naik 

I think a very unique journey, I mean creating a very successful company for a business which is using open source, you know, and you know on the based on top of open source. So in 16 years, right, more than that, that you will, you know, building this company and successful for at least 10 years, if I may say. So with your story, I think you know that success has come because of all the hard work that you put in the first 7 years.

So now what I mean as a founder, as a CEO, what keeps you motivated is, is the leadership role, the challenges that you face today, the disruption that is happening, what keeps you going at this stage after 16 years?

Rahul Bansal 

So like there are 2, like are things like short term, long term, in short term. So first like I want open source to win, for some time over so hero landing page title was open source for the win.

Ameya Naik 

OK.

Rahul Bansal 

And now I like recently come over this ERPNext, which I feel is a big underdog like I mean I am, so it’s like how do I put like so ERPNext founder mentioned somewhere like there are only 2 type of companies in the world, one who use ERPNext and one who will use ERPNext.

Ameya Naik 

OK.

Rahul Bansal 

And I felt like Jyaada ho Gaya, but theek hai, like so like what does it now I’m in ERPNext for 2 years, I really feel that and and it’s open source. So it like so in short term or midterm, I want Frappe ERPNext to grow, that’s like personal mission I have taken up internally because it’s amazing open source solution and it is open source. So it should win, so that’s the short term.

The long term is like I want to, so it’s like you created something as I mentioned that nothing lasts forever. If I am lucky rtCamp will outlast me. That’s the every founder’s dream. More like parent like we should die before our kids. So that means opposite like our kids should live longer than us. So like I want rtCamp to live longer than me.

But then how, so it’s like then we kind of thought like many different ways and one of them came out like if we get acquired, then there’s no guarantee the culture like and especially there’s like this reality check, like the that the incident that happened in June around layoff. I’m not sure if there were voting or maybe if I would have been a public listed companies, non majorities controlling CEO, I might have got fired for taking that decision.

So how do we structure rtCamp so that it will continue to live up to its value. And then that’s where we feel like that it should be more like a public company, somehow owned by employees either in stock or in voting rights. And that is like my longer term goal that to take it public and it would be good testament for open source and open values also like so again in 2016 when things were about to crash, the only, so I was not feeling bad like 7 years of my life was about to get wiped out.

I was feeling bad at nobody would dare to build something so open and so employee friendly because, the the the top reasons people are listing my for my failure were you don’t have employee bond. So as soon as they become good the time they should create like the revenue for you, they get hired or poached by other companies and you don’t have bond mechanism to prevent that.

Second mistake. You are very open source person. You give so much credit that who contributed to the WordPress Core, who did who, which patch, we used to celebrate like this person is contributing to the Core, we used to cut the cake, we used to picture. So you are yourself telling this is my best employee. He contributed the Core. We don’t have any bond with him. We can poach him immediately. So mistake number 2.

So they are like like, OK, in execution, there might be mistake, but I don’t think like I want to trade for that. If my people are leaving for better pay, I need to figure out in what world they get paid better, in what way they can, I can pay them better. I should I should focus on my demand generation side. Like is this not it’s not personal. I did not take it take it personally when people were leaving so that so that was the reason like you are about to crash because we had very high attrition and it was very counterintuitive company with so much people love.

But attrition was real because they were getting 2 to 3 times higher pay. And only when we managed to crack our partnerships and sales side, then we were we were we were able to catch yeah. But before that, the the the wisdom in the industry wisdom was that put a bond, don’t give credit to employees, don’t publish things in open source like typical that insecure mentality of like Indian IT consulting business.

And that was the pain I was feeling. He was when you go down, these people will say ki hamne to sahi bola tha, that is that is employee bond is must for IT consulting. You should not reveal or promote your employees so much on social media. So that was the feeling like and I knew, I was right.

So it is like the thing is like if you have failure in business, people will assume ki Jo tum ne kiya sab kuch wrong hai. It is like company failed that means everything you did was failure. That is that is the lesson I took on in that moment that you can fail but you can still believe that you are right or you are right. You need to trust that failure does not mean you did the wrong things.

That is so just like many things. So so now also that’s drives us like in long term. We want to like make this company self sustainable. I don’t know how we are going to do it, like like many things like in June, I did not know how I am going to save these many jobs, but we ended up saving.

Now we are hiring back to hiring again. We will figure out like there, there are ways we are trying to think we are taking inspiration from the bigger ones like Tata Sons is one of the inspiration like it is a holding company. So we are looking at a trust model where I can park my majority ownership in that trust and then it controls rtCamp. But who will guard the guards that is the question.

Like I am struggling with like it is like eventually somebody has to take a call and when I am gone, how do I, how do I control that somebody whenever or like like so that’s that’s I don’t need so so then I accept like just relax, ne day rtCamp is going to die but you can just work hard to make it that day will like if you work hard, probably that day will take few decades to come.

You can just how to put like prolong it like you cannot avoid it forever. Like someday every every company is going to die. 

Himanshu Daswani

So from what I hear now and also from my experience at rtCamp a couple of years back, you believe a lot in freshers, campus hires. Not only do you believe in that, you not only do you believe in them, you also put your money where your mouth is in that sense, where you invest heavily in training them in hiring them. Of course, there’s a long interview process that you know, you want to, put the freshers through. What made you believe in that idea? What made you believe, you know, freshers are the people who will take it for the fresher people that we should be investing in so much.

Rahul Bansal 

So how do I put like? So when we started like as I mentioned, we had a good start. We were coming from this Devil’s Workshop legacy which has a very big name. Initializing was all filled up. Initial for 1-2 year was good, then came this pressure of catching up, especially with attrition and we realise that so, so how about like the initial reason to hire freshers were budget to be honest, I, I don’t want to miss my word. Yeah, that’s the transparency , that’s our value system.

Because if you had money, we could retain people who were who were leaving for 2 to 3X higher pay. We didn’t have money to retain them. We had limited budget, WordPress still being not taught in school. There were very few people who knew WordPress upfront, those who knew were either our employees, our ex-employees at higher pay or really bad at WordPress that you don’t want to hire.

So like we kind of done with everybody who knew WordPress, like 3 people, our employees, our ex-employees and people who we interviewed and did not want out to be our employee. So then we have to shift to the people who don’t know WordPress. Then came we need to train them. We need and I said, it’s OK because my first initial co-founder didn’t knew WordPress, I taught them. So I was the one who learned WordPress myself.

I taught my friends who then become my co-founder and then that’s how we started. So, and initially also like I thought WordPress to many people, but it was very unstructured and inorganic. Like when somebody used to join, I used to do the pair programming with them. We don’t have like and the hiring was like 1-2 person joining a month, kind of hiring in those days, like early first, first 2 years.

So then we came to fresher hiring is the only thing we can afford. And I and then then I realised knew once we got into this fresher hiring, we realised many new things like one the passion, the hunger of fresher have. I would I don’t have that hunger anymore by the way, I would like forget other, I can relate to myself if I have to code something on Sundays and I chod do na yaar, Netflix and chill.

So it’s like but fresher have that hunger that they have and they have time. Like there are many things like usually they are not married. They don’t have like responsibilities. They have like more time to build their career, more passion, more reason, more hunger, higher growth part. They they know they can grow double in few year like their income and everything. So a lot of headway to grow. That is one part.

Then second, it’s like a clean slate. I also learn like especially when interviewing people who know WordPress but were not our employees, like other companies employee that they were doing things wrong but they were not ready. It’s like it’s OK it works this way. Also why should we change? So it’s like them there’s a 10 ways to do different things and not always lead to the same result.

Like they might lead to same result but not at the same quality. Like some sites will look good, but will break when you start using or scaling and something like that. And especially people who learn wrong things with age, they become very adamant they don’t want to read relearn. I think the AI is that we discussing the threat is from that AI is not. Those who are willing to take AI along will survive jobs. Those who don’t want to change how they code, they are at the risk.

Same with the before AI also like the people who are like 5 years experience. I am 5 years WordPress experience. I am doing this from 5 years. You are telling me this is not the right way. They were like we had these kind of incidences like where people had ego clashes also like what makes you think you are the authority on WordPress. That kind of also heated argument also.

But this is working. How can, it’s working but when the traffic comes at scale, this query will break. And they were like nahi chalta hai, but which fresher that issue was not there. So we realised that, which freshers we can build certain quality, we can we can commit to certain quality like if we give you a this 10 engineers. So it is like the interpersonal differences will be less like. 

So one day I told like I want us our training and systems to so so matured that a project manager says, hey, I have a new project and 3 WordPress engineer and resource manager will say which 3, any 3 because they are all same, same school, I mean the internal training, same book they learn from same skills, they got speed and some minor differences might be there in the way they communicate and the way they write. But then outcome won’t differ much and that is only possible fresher.

So, so when in 2016 we become this big agency and we started become profitable like because of so we become in 2016, we become WordPress VIP Partner that suddenly gave us global recognition. We were the only WordPress VIP Partner from Asia then, just one, just imagine there’s a 43% of web WordPress like today, that’s 43%. At that time in 2016 also WordPress was biggest CMS, it’s enterprise, the premium thing was WordPress VIP. They had 9 partners. One of them was from Asia and we were the only one.

So that bring us huge eyeballs, business to us, saved us from bankruptcy. Amazing thing happened to us. So now then, then actually at that time we question now we can hire people at a good salaries, should we continue fresher and then we realise what started as a desperate major or like the real the with the financial constraint is actually our biggest selling point.

We are here because we cracked this and this is something we can learn from. So then we actually during let double it down. Ab paisa aa gaya hai na, now let us double it down. Now let us invest in fresher. Earlier we were hiring fresher. There is a different way to I would say hiring happens ki kitne log lenge. 

We need 5 people, conservative hiring go and hire people. Then we got inspired by Infosys and we will like let us build something like the Mysore campus. Even I think, last year we had some 70-80 freshers in one go and put them through training and that is actually backfired. So, so because so, so the in COVID, you know like whole world went through digital transformation.

Everybody wants to go online. So the year on year growth of rtCamp was almost 50% for 4 consecutive years. So we overestimated hiring in bull run like this is going to continue forever and suddenly this whatever happen in America or whatever like the macroeconomy. I am not very expert on that, I will avoid commenting. Business did not grow that faster, sometimes like other reasons are also, but whatever they happen like and that is why jyaada hire ho gaye, lets maybe we need to cut half of them. So that is why 80 like let go 40 of them.  

No, we invested them so heavily and that is the investment world because, first hiring cost, insane hiring cost. We filtered these 80 people from 1 lakh,  ek lakh log. We got 1,00,000 application filtered out of them like multiple interview rounds. So much screening, 2000 interviews, then we hired 80 people. Then we put them into 2 batches of 4-6 months apart, then we train them. Trainers, L&D staff, like admin staff and so much.  Then we pay them stipend like ₹50 thousand per month to just to learn WordPress and no commitment. Course khatam, next day they can join our competition. No bond nothing, no non-compete nothing.

And then after that we put them in WordPress Core for another 6 months so they, they learn from the WordPress community. So one year, zero return. So this is a huge CapEx and so we incurred it with the conviction that business will grow at certain rate which like things did not go that well and for some time feld we had a pressure but then we bounced  back. Now the growth rate is back. I do not know what is happening with outside world but we are back, so that investment, so fresher hiring was very simple short term, when we used try a fresher, we used to bring them from colleges 2-3 months, we used to train them and turant hi like we used to put them on client work and get them billable. And but now we we had this large big client become bigger, demanding more quality. Our time to production becomes longer. Initially people used to go in production 3 months, now 6 months only in academy only training, 6 months only training. No matter how boring you feel, because people we have an amazing talent as it rtCampers are diamonds. So those people get very frustrated. Like if you put them in academy, they like I want real, real world. They are very eager to try their hands on real world problem.

That Academy part is like a very frustrating for them, but you put them through that then 6 months you put them in WordPress Core and then they go on real client work after one year. So it is like so much CapEx, but then the quality brings it is like and human resources very challenging like you can manufacture this kind of curve at similar quality easily through machines but creating humans who will deliver same output.

And we are hiring from anywhere like we do not have like our entire thing is online. We are remote. We hire from any city, any college, no college dropout, no matter. Like sometimes other companies, employees also join our fresher campus hiring. 

Ameya Naik

Yeah.

Rahul Bansal

That also happens something.

Ameya Naik 

Very remarkable what you are doing and you know unheard of mid-size or small companies. So the freshers who join you who eventually kind of successfully go through that rigorous process of those 80 or zero point or whatever percent hire, they are very lucky I would say and they would they would have their at least the initial career sorted out for sure. But I would like to know from you, you’ve dealt with so many freshers, you’ve got people for the people who may not get this opportunity. What would be that? How to you know things or advice that you would give them to kind of make their careers in the right way?

Rahul Bansal 

So there, there are many ways like the biggest thing with today’s generation, I’m talking in IT context that you can work from anywhere. So I came to Pune, I settled in Pune, that’s different story. But if I would have been in a small town, I would probably continue from there.

So keeping your expenses in check is first thing if you want to do something out of passion. Otherwise it’s opposite like find the shining job and get stuck in EMI. Otherwise you can follow your passion, learn, learn the skill. There is always like how do I put like. You need to choose what you want to become first and then give.

Give it time and for that to happen to give it time you need runway like so in small town. Cost of living is less if you are from small town don’t unnecessarily move to the large town. Opportunities everywhere especially in open source community. Most companies are remote. rtCamp is not the only one.

In fact, in WordPress community, rtCamp is among the second generation of companies who which became remote later. From insisting that people should come to Pune office to even for interview to now having everything remote, it took us a time to traverse a journey. But many companies are remote in WordPress ecosystem, even in other open source communities. So be part of that. So it depends. Like if you want to join an open source organization as an employee, look for their job board in different ways, contribute to open source project in that community.

For example, if you want to join rtCamp, contribute to the WordPress. If you want to join say ERPNext or Frappe Technologies, you would like to contribute to the Python framework or Python project. If you want to just freelance, which is by the way, best, best way, you can start getting your listed on something like Upwork and having your professional experience like contribute to the projects, GitHub projects in your skill category or in any interest.

In fact, by freelancing journey, I want to highlight one thing like so when I started freelancing, so I wanted to learn what. So I was using WordPress as a Blogger and I wanted to become WordPress engineer, a good one. And they were like, I kind of created a list of things I want to do with WordPress.

Like I want to build WordPress theme, I want to build WordPress plugin, I want to build one something with media gallery, I want to build something with commenting system. So I listed something like 20 kind of vague touch points. It is like a lesson learning plan, but I do not want to learn at my cost.

So what I did, I went to this freelancing platform like Upwork and all, and rather than picking any project coming my way. So like I want to build a WordPress media gallery. I look for people who wanted to hire somebody to build media gallery. Now this is very risky because I am I want to learn it and you want to already hire somebody who can build it So I did give a barter system you pay me only if I build it So that was the first thing no escrow and then I will bid very low like because anyway I want to learn it. So whatever you pay is OK for me.

So, so I kind of learn WordPress at other peoples expense in that way. So I so that way I, I mention that you need to keep runway your expenses in mind so you can build career. And amazing thing about today’s generation is like as a student, you have access to Internet, GitHub and so many are like marketplaces, don’t wait for college to get over. Build something in open source as soon as possible.

Those credentials helps like even in my freelancing, my like on day one, how can you show client work but you need to show something. So I used to say that is something I build, that Firefox extension is my work, that WordPress plugin is something I build.

So you can trust me, you can go and see my code, what kind of quality I put in public. So people have some reference point and these references are more important. I never wrote on any freelancing, that I am a COEP topper, gold medallist and blah blah and hire me because I had a 10, 10/10 CGPA.

It does not matter I never wrote in any pitch what are my education qualifications were or what like and they were good like I was I myself was not dropout, but as I didn’t it doesn’t matter if you want a media gallery plugin in some cases what I did, I built quick prototype say I think and today with AI you can. So this is where you you should power the AI. So you are starting freelancing career. Rather than writing a boring 6 page proposal, actually build something even incomplete, put it somewhere on the and share that link in 6 lines you can get the project.

Hey I saw your requirement.  Are you looking for something like this link and see what that was my style.

Ameya Naik 

Awesome, awesome. Do people who come to you for job or you become an associated, do you still feel that they have some myths associated with WordPress or open source in general?

Rahul Bansal 

Most people still don’t understand how open source companies make money to them, ye to free hai. So like if they are not earning themselves hamko kahaa se pay karenge. So it’s like they they they take OK, WordPress is free so how rtCamp is making money. rtCamp is not making money, How are they going to pay us? So, so there is this misconception some people have this.

So this is a bigger misconception on open source like how like then we have to explain that we are a service company, we charge for time, we charge for this and that with WordPress. There is another problem we face, oh, it is a PHP. So to them many students like they look down on PHP. This is a outdated technology and some things like that. So so those are the resistance we face and that that is that this this is bigger for us like because the whole generation is chasing the trend like everybody chasing AI even we have.

So how do I put like we are so conscious about trend seekers that we don’t want them in that way that we are doing many AI projects in WordPress but we never tell in campus. You want to come, come for the boring work, come for open source. You want AI, hamaare pass nahi. We have, but we don’t tell.

This will reach our campus audience. But yeah, so it’s like we do AI project, why wouldn’t do the all the companies are clients, There’s so much client demand. But so our HR once said like if we showcase our AI slides, we will attract more. We like I don’t want to attract those people.

Because ye kal kuch aur chase karenge. These people have no substance. They they are, kal ko kuch aur trend karega, crypto trend karega,they will chase crypto. I want people who can stand with something they believe through different seasons. Like I trusted open source, 16 years, 18 years, 16 years rtCamp. I become open source enthusiast 2006. Almost like 19-20 years I am, I am with open source, I was with open source when I was a Blogger.

I was open source with as a freelancer, WordPress agency, product company, ERP vertical and I will be with WordPress even if like like I have to start my another business. So what so so the sorry the so the so the belief system is something that stays consistent. Open source is not a trend for me. So it is part of my belief system and I want people who are passionate about open source to be at rtCamp. I do not want people who are chasing AI is no big deal. In fact AI is easy. AI can teach you how to learn AI. It is like, you can you can ask help how you can ask ChatGPT how how how are you built.

I am of course not the research level knowledge you will get, but like you will learn a lot. So like AI can help. So like, but if somebody is restricted in and I want to do something in AI, then we do not want those people. I want like I would be able to do not marry to technologies like like they want.

We want them to be asking questions like what, what kind of impact my work will have or what kind of projects I will be working on, what kind of clients they are, what, what, how your clients do meaningful contribution to the society. So, so it’s like, that’s why like we don’t advertise.

In fact, we, we, we, so there was even a one trend like, so we offer like MacBook to everyone. That’s another. And it’s not like like shining something you that that’s a part of our logistical decision. Like if everybody’s using same machine, it will be easier to support them and we will save system admin cost.

So it worked commercially for us to give everybody MacBook and then for one year HR highlighted it in campus and I told is baar batch kharab aayegi, ti actually that happened because they they put open source in the second paragraph and MacBook, paid news, stipend all the commercial aspects in the first and I because we are such a, the center is I saw it on social media after it went live.

And I DM immediately, this kind of ad will attract only greedy people. Only put open source and if you are passionate about open source, be with us. Everything is a surprise for you. The pay scale, the growth, everything. Don’t promise it because we want people to value their contribution. Aisa nahi ki paisa doge to kuch bhi kar lenge.

Himanshu Daswani 

Speaking of mindset and also I believe you validated on soft skills, is there are there specific soft skills or mindset you would suggest one would need to succeed in today’s technical landscape, specifically in open source?

Rahul Bansal 

Communication skill. So and when I say communication skill, it’s not like good English, which is must by the way, especially open source communities are distributed like most of them and then basically are working with people remotely. So a lot of time how do I put like so there. So there like the different ways to communicate and how I would put like the your communication need to be very good in terms of comprehension.

Like it’s not about the length, it’s about the entropy. Like the the value your message brings for the one example I give always like about the communication skill to like within rtCamp always. So you are working on something you couldn’t finish your job. Just imagine variation. At the end of the day you say sorry I couldn’t finish it and logout.

We are not doing English here, of course, English will the grammar and will all the software will take care of English. So that only tells client you could not do it today. But it does not tell client can you do it tomorrow or OK message number 2, I could not do it today, I will do it tomorrow, still incomplete. What will change tomorrow that you could not do it today, but you will be able to do it tomorrow?

Whether it is a technology constraint, you are busy, something happen at home and you could not work so there like so. So you have to anticipate what follow up questions will be and try to guess those questions and answer them upfront. Because this is the remote work, open source is decentralised. You have to cut down the number of back and forth. You are not chatting with your friends on WhatsApp with short messages or like like that.

That is that is a very different dynamic or like both are in the same time zone. I will like exchanging message at the same time. I could not do it, sorry, I could not do it today, tomorrow I will do it. I, I, I ran into an API call issue blah blah blah and I managed to found a solution, but I ran out of time. So I have a solution already. I will deploy it tomorrow.

So it is like you have to anticipate, try to be as verbose as possible. Try to because there are many thing like verbosity gives you details those details basically reduces somebody’s anxiety then anticipating follow up questions tells your maturity and eventually like skills, are actually, in AI these communication skill is even more important and if you tell AI that is so I can improve your English.

But this 3-5 level of depth of human anticipation, what will be the follow up question you have to read your message before, aur kya puchega ye, what might he be thinking or what this client might be thinking and then adding more rewriting it 5-6 times so that that that that skill is the most important skill in my opinion, because coding part is actually is easy now in AI like AI world. And when you communicate like this, you become like, like the like the people, the person everybody wants to work with.

Ameya Naik 

And one very good in distinction that you point out is communication skill is not just about the language.

Rahul Bansal 

Yeah, 

Ameya Naik

Right, it is also about the maturity. So its about the context. Its also about anticipating what the other person is doing and you don’t need great vocabulary and get English for being a good communicator. And that’s some brilliant example that you gave the 3 parts of communication.

I think most of most of the, you know, people, the freshers. Or even, you know, experienced people fail is when they when they say that, you know, when somebody says that your communication is not good, they feel under English is not. And that, you know, I’ve also seen this in life. That doesn’t matter at all. What matters is, you know, your awareness, your consciousness, your confidence, the context that you said, right? I mean, so amazing example. Thanks, thanks a lot for that.

So we are almost coming towards the end of our podcast and I wish we had, you know, lots of time to chat about so many other things with you. But one thing that I would like to ask you from my side while going is, you know, you spoke about your north star a little bit earlier. What do you think? And you also spoke about rtCamp. What, what, where do you want it to go a little bit? But if you had to kind of explain it concisely as to what is rtCamp’ss north star now, right. You’ve, you’ve been 16 years, great journey right, now for the next 16 years, where do you see rtCamp?

Rahul Bansal 

So in fact this has been discussed very openly within rtCamp, so the way I see it like I even mentioned it many times in many discussions that so I so this is, there is a movie called Founder, is based on McDonald’s and something we did with our fresher hiring that you can give me any 3 engineers and they will be the same. I want to do it at a very high scale like very large scale and I want to do that kind of scaling with our leadership in like right from me, like I should be replaceable by softwares and people. So we want to replicate, grow at very fast pace but systematically.

Less, so it is like we are we are IT consulting companies was like we are in people’s business we will be delivering people at the end of the day, people will be delivering things but we want to grow decentralised. Well let me put this way when I look, at so I don’t want this very like high like a vertical org structures. When I say McDonald’s I want more like a franchise of rtCamps where they are like pockets of 100, 100 rtCamp people and literally, like randomly you pick any lot and you will get the same qualities like this is the McDonald’s and and I have experienced it.

I have. So I think McDonald’s Filet-O-Fish is a trademark burger and I have eaten them at least in 13 countries till now, same quality. So that’s my inspiration. Like I want to that Filet-O-Fish burger is my inspiration that I want every rtCamp we produce from the fresher hiring. And that is for not just the engineers. We want to bring same consistency in managers, leadership. And that is I think we should be doing to go public because then that that is like unstoppable rtCamp. That’s like that’s my kind of last contribution. Like like to take it to the level where I become obsolete.

Ameya Naik 

Yeah, I feel like if you know you are hearing your journey, hearing your stories, you live and breathe for rtCamp and open source. And I think you know Himanshu asked you this question about question north star and I think your north star looks like it is very similar to what is rtCamp’s north star.

Rahul Bansal 

So as I mentioned, I have no life outside work.

Ameya Naik 

Right.

Rahul Bansal 

And I don’t feel even need for it like many times like rtCamp when we are like very hard to decouple.

Ameya Naik 

Rahul, this is being a brilliant conversation and you know, we still not, I think scratched the surface of the person that Rahul is in terms of his love for food. I have heard so many food references and I am a foodie myself. So I am sure we will do many more such conversations where we would love to know a little bit more about your, you know, food preferences, you know, your passion for building a culture.

Even I mean, I have been a very big proponent of, you know, creating this culture and very inspired by stories that you that you just told about rtCamp. I feel there was a poster boy for somebody who would you know who, who, who we say that, you know, this guy is the epitome of, you know, supporting open source, it would be Rahul.

Rahul Bansal 

No, it’s like I believe there people who are much better than work in open source like so this this Frappe’s is founder Rushabh Mehta like I am nowhere close to his commitment to open source do.

Ameya Naik

Ok.

Himanshu Daswani 

You ever get a chance, you know, to meet these people like the founder of Frappe ERPNext also.

Rahul Bansal

Yeah, yeah.

Himanshu Daswani 

What are the conversations like in those rooms when you when you know for because then the tables are turned around, right? This is one customer speaking to a CEO. So in those things, what are the conversations like?

Rahul Bansal 

So, so it’s like, so like in the case of WordPress and like the Frappe, we are an ecosystem players conversation can happen sometimes. So the strategic discussion around things we are working on some kind of feedback mechanism. It is like, so it is like, you know, like this, this blind spot like everybody has one. So it is like the level at which they are operating. Sometimes they miss things.

So as one of the person in their ecosystem, I take that opportunity to convey was, I think this is something we are not doing right. Or I, I try to give critical feedback because praises they keep hearing a lot. So I believe like if I’m getting 5 minutes, 10 minutes with them, I should use that time to poke fingers at something like this is something we should be changing or we should be doing differently because these are big projects, like their founders are super busy and they are like a lot bigger public personalities like they are they have very small amount of time like you have to make use of it.

Himanshu Daswani 

We saw what multiple topics that involved around people, right? Any. So one thing that I notice from your leadership, your core team right now is like, let’s say you or Vivek or Radhe or Aviral you know even Maitreyie and Nikita and everyone that’s in the core team currently, you sort of have a way of complementing each other perfectly, right? Like it just fits in. Like the core team just fits in.

Do you remember any interviews that you took of any of these guys, like if you can give me 2 instances, one which was a very funny interview, but it’s not funny in the sense like the interview didn’t go but finally like left the memorable impact on you, ki bhai ye interview tha and one interview that you immediately thought ki ye chahiye, ye hona chahiya.

Rahul Bansal 

Immediately, like this person we need to hire.

Himanshu Daswani 

Ye to matlab core team mein aana chahiye.

Rahul Bansal 

I don’t think I got that core team wala hunch for anybody on day one, but I don’t even that even cross my mind like that is like more of so it is like initial founders were different then everybody else that ended up in core team either become through the qualification like growth or their unique role like and also there is like core team is not monolith like so it is like it is like it is not like all the core team member meets all the time. So if the discussion is around campuses like yesterday to be we posted 2 jobs and suddenly there is a hiring pressure back.

So I will be having more meeting with Nikita and HR like we are starting a new vertical, so focus back to Nikita. Like I need another training syllabus, more like a new engineering course and it’s like a like pehle we would do mechanical, now we need civil engineering. So something like that sort of more meeting will happen with Nikita, in terms of interview, memorable interview, there were many. The most memorable was Rakshit Thakker still like like part of core. So how do I put like so, so as I said, like some sometimes I really feel I’m lucky, just lucky.

I don’t know why or how I get things my way. Some of the things goes my way. So Rakshit is one of the most amazing person I ever worked with in terms of and he has a rare quality of understanding technology and business both at the same time. He can very few engineers can talk to business side of customer in the same conversation, like switching between them. I can only count on fingers like even after working with 600 people till late.

So in Rakshit’s interview, I so I really then 15 minutes only again Pune mein interview like very old rtCamp 2019. He was one of I think first 15-20 people we hired, like he came to office, took interview and and then I start switch the interview mode like I said. So usually in interview ask questions you know answer to next person answer and you can verify it’s like exam.  I thought ye banda to hire ho gaya, what if he doesn’t not accept my job? I have 40 more minutes, 1 hour ka interview tha. So I started asking questions whose answers I did not know.

Ameya Naik 

OK.

Rahul Bansal 

So seekh lete is a 40 minute, so so I had some questions about database scaling, something like I was reading but like like I was researching one few topics as part of my work. I just started asking him. And I was so whatever answer is giving must be right, so knowledge badha lo and I was somehow I felt like ye banda bahut smart hai, yahan to accept nahir karega and it turned out to be later like he was. I think Saurashtra University, something Gujarati University is gold medalist.

Later on I learned like he had an offer from many companies. For some reason I am unable to recall he wanted to join a company in that radius like Koregaon Park ke aas paas ki company he want only wanted to join and rtCamp was one of the company which which fit into his geographical radius and then interview hua and he joined, still with us. So like, so it’s like hota na, like you realise ki ye toh hire ho gaya hai, but I use the remaining time to learn from him.

Himanshu Daswani 

Speaking of big companies, I remember one story that I was telling me about, but if you can just put some light on that. You also had an interview set up with one of the big company, I think Microsoft or something.

Rahul Bansal 

Google.

Himanshu Daswani 

Google yeah. You were travelling at that point, so what was that again, now they are a client. 

Rahul Bansal 

Yeah, Google is our client, so so my relationship with Google is quite multi-layered. My first paycheck came from Google in the form of Adsense. That is how like pehli kamai. I like that I still have a picture of that. I posted it few years back again on social media. I still hold it to my heart like first pay cheque is first pay cheque then then I as I mentioned like I was topper in COEP, 10/10 in CGPA like rank 1.

I got shortlisted for Google interview but I did not such like the first, first one was telephonic round and on the same day my friend’s brother was running for election and I had to go to village to do some on ground work and I did not realise that was such a remote village. There was no telephone network even for the BSNL.

I used to have a BSNL phone but BSNL ka cabinet room bhi nahi tha in that rural area only when I came back to like in evening like so in that like town place I got this miss call alerts the feature like if you are out of range then they there was a miss call from some Hyderabad number SMS, I called back. I reached to Google IVR. Should Google connect for interview and then I called my TNP to garam ho gaey, nai nai. How can you be so careless the the only thing expected from you was to stay in range.

Brother, my brother’s, my friend’s brother won the election, I had to reach there, kismat me raho to we wil,l Google and we will meet again and then we meet again with Google.

Ameya Naik

I am sure how that you are going to inspire millions more than what you have already. And we look forward to the day where, you know, we can talk to you like this when you are, you know, kind of inspiring the world with your vision. I think it’s a great vision that you have. And I think the company that you’re building is awesome. And it’s very inspirational for, you know, not only, you know, early careers professionals, but also for somebody who are entrepreneurs who are building their companies like me.

And I think it has been a pleasure. It has been, you know, very exciting, thorough conversation. And I feel that, you know, we should do this more often with thanks a lot for, you know, kind of mentoring this session over here. And we love to, you know, catch up with you once again. Thank you.

Rahul Bansal 

Thank you for hosting me, it is really pleasure, you are doing amazing things.

Ameya Naik 

Thank you, Rahul, see you again.